What Do I Do Now?
by xxLivingPuppetxx234
Summary: A sequel to The Tiger and The Chocobo


What Do I Do Now?

Chapter 1,

Leash and Collar

"Will you take flight? Fly upon the wings of eagles towards the Goddess' prom---"

"Enough."

Clang.

"Sephiroth!"

"Cloud! Just run!"

Ungh!

"W-Why...Genesis...why have you fled from m---"

"You did...g-good...C-Cloud..."

Bubbles began to float to the top of the Mako green water tube as raven spiked locks twitched about in the water as silhouettes of white lab coat draped figures passed by now and again. Their eyes ever gleaming at the sight of the figure in the tube; the once proud 2nd Class, seemingly promoted, 1st Class SOLDIER, now, a common lab rat in the ShinRa labs. Once lively and bouncy young SOLDIER, Zack Fair was now a guinea pig lab rat at the use of discretion of the lead Scientist of ShinRa Labs, Hojo. The inhabitants of ShinRa labs would now and again, glance his way, checking for signs of life in the silent form of Zack Fair. It was expected, with his level of Mako coursing through his body, that it wouldn't be much longer before the young man chose to wake up, compared to his partner in crime, as the blond in the tube beside him had been dubbed. Little to no hope was planned for the blond to ever open his eyes again, let alone live through the possibilities of Mako poisoning. No limits were set either man; both were equal in the supposed crime that ShinRa had created to cover up what had really happened in Niblehiem. No one had counted on Genesis appearing at the Mako Reactor and egging on the already fractured General Sephiroth; let alone, getting into his head what he really was. Following to the letter, every plan that ShinRa had hoped would happen, but not to the extent that it had happened. Countless victims had been laid to waste in Niblehiem, while the only near casualties were of the 1st Class SOLDIER, Zackary "Zack" Fair, and an unknown Cadet. Hojo had taken great lengths to obtain the blond haired boy wonder that had been found with imprints upon his palms where he had grasped tightly onto the hilt of Zack's discarded weapon. Plunged the weapon into the mere spine of the great General and then to haphazardly, survive, being run through by the General's prized weapon. Not a trace of Mako had been found in Cloud's system, but it wouldn't stop the experimentation. Even with Zack Fair, known friend of the young Cadet, already infused with countless amounts of the source of the planet, it didn't stop experimentation on the young SOLDIER.

"Patient 257 still appears to be inactive; vitals are stable, but no changes that can be seen. It has been ordered that the liquid surrounding his tube is to be drained at 0800 hours per Professor Hojo's orders," a click of a tape recorder could be heard in the silence of the dark and dreary laboratory; a young lab assistant was drawling over the "specimens" as they had been dubbed, recording all orders and dictations into the device in his hand, "Begin the process now."

As inactive as Patient 257 may have appeared; he was active within the subconscious of his mind as he looked on with his mind's eye at the people beginning the process to undo the drowning sequence as his mind had dubbed it. Same old routine, boring as ever. Typical. Can't you guys change the routine up a little? Come on. A guy likes variety in his life...this getting old, like Hojo is getting old and uglier...so you can say he's not aging with grace. How about, you over there, come in with your head shaved, and you, yeah you, you come in tomorrow morning wearing a lime green tutu? How about it? Huh? Heh...no one ever listens to the comatose guy.

How could anyone listen to someone unable to speak, let alone move at this point in his life? Zack had gotten off easy, or as easy as it could be for a SOLDIER when he had faced down against Sephiroth when he had spotted the man going after the hidden Ancient, or so she was dubbed. Sephiroth had all but love tapped the young man into one of the metal containers, but it was Genesis who would later spark Sephiroth's rage to attack Cloud when he attacked the man for harming a young female. She had been at the wrong place, at the wrong time. Genesis had been the fuel added to the fire that time; it may have been the reason why Sephiroth had managed to run Cloud through like he had. Cloud had been the one he had taken his frustrations out on before due to Genesis' actions towards him, all the while, Zack had taken the faint brunt of the man's back hand. Now, both men were in tubes, in ShinRa labs; just waiting to be used as laboratory experiments. It had seemed impossible for Zack to cry when he had been carried off to the labs, but he knew he could, just not on the outside. In his heart, and in his mind, he had cried. Cried for freedom, escape, a way to get out of here and take Cloud out with him; he had cried the hardest for Angeal.

What lies could they be filling the man's head with regarding his standing with ShinRa and what had happened at Niblehiem?

ShinRa was only known for one thing.

Lying.

And they did it well.

~XXX~

"T-Tifa? TIFA!?"

"Cloud...run..."

BANG!

"H-How are you able to do this?"

"Sir, what about this one?"

"Take him along too...to believe, someone like him, someone as scrawny as him, managed to run that sword through Sephiroth. Tch, that man is a built wall and yet he was brought down by a little farm boy..."

All of that, it was far away now. But the words used to describe him, little farm boy, was hardly a way to describe him; he may not have had it as easy as everyone else who had joined ShinRa's Cadet Infantry Program, but he had worked hard to make it into ShinRa. From as long as he could remember, he was always put down as being the scrawny, little nobody, who had no clue who his Father was. As early as he was able to walk and understand what the grown ups were saying; he had learned a number of words, some aimed at him, some at his Mother. He was aimed and shot at with the words, "Bastard child" while his Mother had to suffer through the words of, "whore", "slut", "tramp", and countless others that were never to be repeated. His Mom had been a tough old bird, even up until the time he had free to visit her on the mission to Niblehiem; she had worried and fussed over him so that she did and he had told her to stop many a time. But it had been a helpless means to stop her mother henning and it had had failed as he had fallen into his Mother's arms, crying. He hadn't cry like he had then before he had left for ShinRa, everything had been too much to handle at that time, what he wouldn't have given for that comfort once again. The cold feel of the tube had been as cold as the steel that had stuck him like a pig in that Reactor; it may have not been apparent that it frightened him to the very core. Being comatose seemed to have its advantages, especially, Mako poisoning had its advantages; it wasn't showing on him yet, but it would eventually. Cloud had entered into ShinRa at a Class D rank, but in the time that he had found himself, lost in time; he had been seemingly promoted to a class that was at near match to SOLDIER. A promising future had awaited him when he had joined ShinRa, but that had all changed when he had found himself falling madly in love, as crazy as it may have sounded and seemed, in love with the head of the Turks.

Now, he didn't know if he even had that.

He had cried his own silent tears to himself in his subconscious in the state of comatose after the Mako had taken its poisonous hold on him; he couldn't even feel the push of rushing flow of Mako flowing around and down around him. He didn't feel the hands pulling him out of the tube and laying him out against the cold metal steel exam table. Routine as usual; nothing changed. Thank Gaia for the Mako Poisoning; he didn't have to feel the touches of the lab assistants as they touched, grabbed, poked and probed, as well as injected his body with countless things. He wouldn't want to be awake, not ever, to feel what was happening to him.

I'm glad Tseng can't see me like this...not now...I don't think he'd even recognize me...

"What about 372, what do you want done to him?" one of the other assistants asked as he eyed Cloud's still form, "Doesn't seem like he could react to anything we do anymore, what more could we do?"

Another assistant seemed to stare at the questioning assistant with lack of sympathy, or void of sympathy in his face, "Whatever Hojo ordered to have done to the kid, do it..."

Yes, whatever that man asked to be done, it was to be done and Cloud was powerless to stop it; as was Zack.

Tseng...I...need...you...

~XXX~

"I had to file papers away after the little ditz managed to file them in the wrong spot," a feminine voice could be heard speaking to him, but comprehending her babbling was something else, "Isn't that funny, Tseng?"

It had been hard to do this.

Even for him.

It had been nearly a year and a half, nearly two years now since the incident of Niblehiem had happened, and more like it had been five years since it had all had happened. He had been called in not long after to help clean what had happened in Niblehiem; he had withheld all personal emotion about the clean up. When he had returned back to Headquarters after the clean up mission in Niblehiem, paperwork had been filed and things had been settled; Tseng had taken to crying to himself in private. In the coming weeks after the Niblehiem clean up mission, a number of Turks and other members of ShinRa had attempted to hook Tseng up with a date with a willing woman. Each woman had gone through the paces with Tseng, but each time, it ended up the same way; each woman walked away with an annoyance of the man's inability to be with women.

This one was just like the rest of them.

Except, "Tseng, are you listening?"

His attention seemed diverted off to something else; he saw a couple of men from his department talking to one another, one was flirting with the other, and the other seemed oblivious to the flirting one's interests. A soft smile had pulled to his lips in his subconscious thoughts; at one time, that had been he and Cloud, except the oblivious and flirting one. They had been both oblivious to one another's interests in one another. Where had those times gone? They were slowly being ruined by the stiletto heel grinding in his groin while the other was tracing up and down his thigh by the flirtatious female across from him.

"I have to go back to the office..."Tseng pushed away from the table as he tried as discreetly as possible to get her advances off his mind, as wrong as they may have seemed to him, "It was nice seeing you."

But it seemed that this female was hard in the head, "Alright then..."

Tseng felt the woman's hand grab onto the back of his ass as if to pin down her want to get it through to him that she knew what he meant, "I don't know if you understand what I mean; I have business to attend to."

A soft giggle came from the woman's lips as she wrapped her arms around his waist, her lioness like grip sinking onto the front of his hips, sliding down to between the man's thighs, "Stop being so uptight, Tseng. Your work will still be there, I'm just trying to show you a good time," her body began to press up, uncomfortably close by Tseng's standards, "...Let me show you what it's like to be with a woman..."

"I SAID NO!" Tseng shouted as he pushed the woman off him; the force of his push sent the woman tumbling into the cafe table, "Sorry, but I need to return to my work. Excuse me."

A dark whisper spread through her lips which left Tseng's ears; much like the fiery tingle of people talking wrongly about the man. Call him what you liked, but when he meant such a command; he truly meant it. He was a forced to be reckoned with on a good day, or even a bad day, but lately; he had been becoming that force, ten times over. No one was able to pin down why his mood had changed so drastically; everyone assumed that he was angry at not noticing that there was a traitor, or traitors, within the walls of ShinRa. Those close to the man knew the real reason. The truth behind what had happened to Cloud and Zack was being hidden from him, when he had the documents regarding the mission in front of him. Every one of the words was a lie. His anger and change of mood had been leading to rumors spreading throughout the compound that he might have been connected in way with the "internal traitors." Such rumors began to bring about questions of his loyalty to ShinRa, but he continued to show that he was loyal by disproving all the rumors, all except the possible connection with the "internal traitors."

That one he couldn't disprove.

Those that knew Tseng personally, much like; Reno, Cissnei and Rude, kept their distance then and even no, but it wasn't much long after the near fail mission in Niblehiem, Cissnei had been moved to a different location, Rude had been sad to see her go. But as far as Intel went, they managed to keep in close contact through emails and the occasional phone call; it wasn't easy for Turks to stay in constant contact like they were. Reno had been spending less and less time with Rufus, not because they were looking to face a fall out; it was mainly that Rufus was finding himself more and more being asked to sit on meetings. His father had asked for him to do so for it would be the young man's future position to have to do so once he would be taking over the company once the President was out of the picture. There was one word that Rufus had for these meetings, boring. He would've rather been spending his time alone, in his room, with his thoughts, but the President wouldn't let him out of his sight. Every waking second was spent in meetings or in the President's office to sit in on office meetings between the President and important people.

If this was what the future held for him…then please, oh sweet Goddess, kill him now.

As for the thought of falling outs between couples, one man who hadn't been heard from was Angeal; the man had all but gone into hiding, especially to hide away from the students that ShinRa kept peddling onto him. Each was much like the last.

A fan boy.

Angeal had been assigned countless new students that were at or near the same class Zack had been when he had been accounted for lost in the Niblehiem mission. Each one had all but done all they could to get on the man's good side like Zack had, but when they got too close. They would be placed with another mentor. The men was being constantly monitored, but never once had he slipped into any form of visible depression. Long psychological evaluations had come up with no changes, the only thing that had changed was the way he handled the students placed in his charge. One such case was unfolding at this moment and it was about to end up in a way that it had always ended.

The man angrily screaming at the teen, nearly slipping Zack's name in place of the student's actual name, "Word has it Commander Hewley, you and 2nd Class Zack Fair were really close…_really close_, any of it true?"

Just the way the young man spoke the words "_really close"_ was enough to set Angeal off, but he had to be the bigger man as he calmed his body down before staring the young man in the eye, "Zackary was a young man that reminded me of myself at that age. The only closeness we had was the understanding of one another since we were both from country boy backgrounds. That is all."  
"That's not what rumor has it as, Commander," the young man's arm created a block in the Commander's way, "Rumor has it that you and Fair were close in a relationship sens---"

All eyes turned towards the smack that was heard, resounding throughout the SOLDIER Hall, "Now you listen to me you, you little bastard. 2nd Class Zack Fair was _twice _the SOLDIER you or any other little boy in this building will ever be. Don't you _ever _speak ill of him! Now get out of here," Angeal held back tears of pure anger and hatred, backing off before he had to be hauled away from the boy, "…Whatever you heard about him and I in the past. Talk you want, but I will not stand by and watch tear apart someone's reputation that can't defend his reputation."

"…Sorry sir," the young man turned away from the Commander as he headed for where he would be sent regardless of Angeal's actions.

"What are you all looking at? Back to what you were doing," Angeal snapped as he turned on his heels and headed back for his dorm, _I want Zack…but…I don't know if I can still feel you…Lies have covered up the truth about feeling you…Zack…are you…are you still with me?_

~XXX~

_Sigh._

A gentle smile came from the secretary sitting betwixt Rufus and the President's offices, "They should be finished momentarily."

"I just want to see Rufus; can't he just walk out of th---"a door opened as a solemn faced Rufus walked out to a surprised faced Reno.

The momentary reunion between the star struck lovers was interrupted by the sound of President ShinRa storming out of his office, a stormy look on his face, "Hold all my calls," he wasn't thrilled by the sight Rufus walking away and towards the red headed Turk as he took the man by the hand and lead him away from the offices, "I'm going home early. I don't want to be disturbed, if it's an emergency, send a Turk or a SOLDIER. Anyone that tries to disturb me will be dealt with swiftly."

A soft nod of the young woman was granted to the President as she went about her business; when the President was unhappy, everyone was in fear of losing their job. Purely out of fear of saying the wrong thing to the man, that in his rage, he would automatically fire them. The man that use to work in Accounting that made sure the budget was balanced for ShinRa projects find himself working at cleaning Chocobo stables at the Chocobo Ranch in Edge. Reason why? Let's just say; when the President has found out that his son's markings on his neck and chest were not from a female acquaintance; it made for a bad day at work. Even now, Rufus was sitting on the fence of direct punishment from his own Father when he had stormed out of his Father's office. What he wanted now was a distraction and that's what Reno was as he found himself being used as Rufus' own personal chew toy as the young man slammed Reno against a wall. Ripping open the young man's collar of his shirt as he began chewing on Reno's neck, viciously. Reno like any other person that was in such a relationship with another man didn't mind the occasional over dominant partner where there was some slight pain involved. But something was bugging and chewing at Rufus that was making him act this way today, if he didn't stop Rufus now; he would end up looking a chewed up slipper. That eventually, sooner or later, Rufus would later spend hours, even days, apologizing for all the marks and bruises he had left on Reno. He didn't like being vicious with Reno; the only reason he could give for acting like he did was his Father.

"Nnmh…R-Rufus…what's wrong? You only ever get li—Umngh!...like this when your old man's done something bad by you…"Reno groaned as he felt another mark begin to leave its mark on his neck as he pushed Rufus slightly away, "Rufus, what's wrong? Rufus?"

Rufus' tears that now streamed down his face weren't the usual, 'I can't believe I did this because my Father has pushed me this far,' tears, "…Rufus?"

"…We fought about Niblehiem again…and…" Rufus turned his face away from Reno, but there was no hiding anything from the one that loves you the most, "…he…"

Reno took one look at Rufus' face, "…and the old man slugs you for trying to find out the truth when he tries to hide his screw ups and wrong doings," his fingers softly brushed against the forming black eye around Rufus' left eye; feeling sorry for touching it as Rufus flinched, "Come on, I've got a Cure in my room."

"…Why do you still care? For all you know, I could've known that Zack and Cloud aren't prisoners of war, or at best dead. And yet, you don't see the evil in me."

"It's because I don't see your old man in you. That's why I still care," Reno softly smiled as he left a soft kiss against the young man's cheek as he closed the door to his room behind them; locking the world outside.

_I wouldn't still care if I was to blame you for it all happening…_

~XXX~

Mixed screams garbled from the exam as wires connected to every known part that cloud be wired was being coursed through with electricity and Mako. The screams were blocked by the gag in his mouth until all the screams ended; it was utter torture, day in and day out for the last five years. Even if the screams weren't humanly possible to be heard or made out, they were still there through the poisoned state he was in; Zack could only watch on in horror at the sight of his young friend being tortured. He had watched for countless years now the tortures that had gone while his young friend couldn't physically show his distress.

"Up the Mako dosage tomorrow, then once he's awake, put him through the usual paces, and then up it again. I want him to be at the peak of where his friend is," Hojo's dark smile grimaced over the passed out form of a blond, "To think, this boy with little to no Mako in his system was capable of doing the damage he did to Sephiroth. Such a marvelous being."


End file.
